The left has obviously adopted a much lower standard for journalistic integrity since the days of Jayson Blair and Dan Rather. Instead of conceding to said “journalist” being caught with his / her hand in the cookie jar, the left now pretends nothing happened. Case-in-point is the New York Times’ Cairo Bureau Chief, David Kirkpatrick. Despite being thoroughly discredited for his work of fiction about Benghazi last December, National Public Radio (NPR) has seen fit to give Kirkpatrick voice during an interview about… well, Benghazi.
Dan Rather: Shouldn’t he be angry that Kirkpatrick still considered credible?
Here is how NPR introduced Kirkpatrick (lies in bold):
New York Times Middle East correspondent David Kirkpatrick spent months on the ground in Benghazi trying to get to the bottom of exactly what happened there [should be, “trying to cover up exactly what happened”]. His article “A Deadly Mix in Benghazi” was published in the Times in December 2013. He spoke with more than 100 people and tried to reconstruct the events of that day [in a weird sort of way, kinda accurate]. And he has identified Ahmed Abu Khattala, a militant who appears to have been a leader of the attack.
Did you catch the wording of that last sentence? While it’s true that Kirkpatrick identified Khattala in his report, he didn’t identify him as having been a leader of the attack. The State Department did that for him days later. Hence, that’s likely the reason for NPR’s careful phrasing.
In his report from December, Kirkpatrick said that there was no evidence of any international terrorist groups being involved in the attack; that there was no evidence that Sufian bin Qumu was involved; and that there was no evidence of al-Qaeda involvement.. Both the State Department and a bi-partisan Senate Select Committee (SSI) debunked these claims. Bin Qumu was identified by the State Department as being a suspect and someone with al-Qaeda ties. The SSI identified the Jamal Network as being involved; it is an international terrorist group based in the country (Egypt) where Kirkpatrick is a Bureau chief.
Laughingly, right out of the gate, Kirkpatrick talks about the pervasiveness of “theories” that surrounded what happened in Benghazi:
The killing of Ambassador Stevens had become a major issue in American politics and also just a murder mystery. There was an astonishing number and variety of theories about how and why he had died on the night of Sept. 11, 2012, at the American diplomatic mission in Benghazi.
Theories? Kirkpatrick put forth blatantly provable falsehoods as facts in his novel disguised as a journalist work.
As he’s done repeatedly, Kirkpatrick doubles down on assertions he’s made that have subsequently been proven false. Check out this extremely twisted logic, which is an apparent attempt to thread the needle between his reporting that Sufian bin Qumu “played no significant role in the attack”, ditto al-Qaeda. The State Department not only identified bin Qumu as being involved but it also conceded his ties to al-Qaeda.
This is how a weasel does what a weasel does. Kirkpatrick told NPR:
“That wouldn’t surprise me at all if individuals were present in Benghazi who had those kinds of ties. It was that sort of port of call. If one of those individuals is present and there’s an attack going on at the American mission, are they going to stay home? No. Of course they will join the attack. There is no evidence whatsoever that al-Qaida or any group linked to al-Qaida played a role in organizing or leading the attack.”
Jayson Blair
Instead of getting mad at the left, folks like Jayson Blair and Dan Rather should be angry with the New York Times and NPR for continuing to maintain that David Kirkpatrick is totally different from… Rather and Blair.